


Front Row View

by textbookchoices



Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:08:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28202127
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/textbookchoices/pseuds/textbookchoices
Summary: And it isn’t like it’s exactly new. Luke and Reggie have been sharing the stage, and the microphone for years now, and Reggie has always loved it.Loved the music.He loves themusic.
Relationships: Luke Patterson/Reggie (Julie and The Phantoms)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 100
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	Front Row View

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tablelamp](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tablelamp/gifts).



Reggie stares down at the notebook in his hands, the pages crinkled and slightly wet in spots. He’s chewing on the end of his pen absently. There are scribbles in different shades of pen and pencil all across the page, sprawling out along the lines and margins. More than half of them are scratched out, words and chords written and re-written and re-written all over again over again.  
  
He sighs and makes a face at the page.  
  
Writing songs isn’t exactly Reggie’s forte. It’s really more Luke’s thing—and for good reason. Luke is a natural at writing. He can put down a song in half an hour, spitting out hits like it’s magic. Reggie has been jealous of Luke’s ability to just write emotion into a song in a way that makes sense and sounds good since, well, since they weren’t dead at the very least.  
  
But Reggie wants to write something.  
  
Ever since they played the show at the Orpheum with Julie—and, okay, maybe before that, maybe since Luke—

Reggie said he wasn’t good at the whole putting his emotions into words thing, right?  
  
But ever since The Time That Reggie Doesn’t Know How to Explain (or okay, even earlier than that), he’s been feeling something in his stomach, something sick and churning and terrifying and he doesn’t know what to do about it, and he figures, well.

Music always makes him feel better.

God, it’s one of his favorite things to just lay back with a good song playing and just let it sink into him.

Music can make him scream with righteous anger, cry hot, angry tears, or laugh with joy. He can’t hear music without his body buzzing with it—the emotion, the meaning. Music is—it’s the best way to communication. To let people understand what you’re feeling.

Right?

He hopes so.

He’s trying, anyway.

He knows he’s not exactly the, uh, smartest kid in the class, and sometimes he doesn’t know what he’s saying or understand what people are trying to tell him. But this—whatever this feeling is—it’s important. He thinks.

It’s important to him anyway.

It could be important to Luke, maybe.

God, is Reggie the only one feeling like this, seriously?

Stupid Luke and his stupid declaration that he _has chemistry with everybody_ which is, quite frankly, ridiculous and Luke absolutely does **not** have chemistry with everyone. Nope. No way. Ridiculous.

But maybe slightly true. Slightly.

He definitely has chemistry with Julie, that’s not—that’s not really up for debate.

And Reggie knows there’s probably something more there than just stage presence. It’s obvious enough.

But the way his stomach clenches when Luke grins at him, when he touches the back of his neck, both of them sweaty and filled up with musical elation, that’s—that’s more than just chemistry, isn’t it?

And it isn’t like it’s exactly _new_. Luke and Reggie have been sharing the stage, and the microphone for years now, and Reggie has always loved it.

Loved the music.

He loves the _music_.

It’s not like he’s in love with Luke or anything. That would be—that would be pretty pathetic. Haha.

Reggie lets his head fall forward, forehead hitting the notebook paper with a thump and an _oomph_ as he groans. Who knew you could keep pining after literally dying. Although that whole death do you part thing was apparently a lie—you pretty much stick together with the people you die with, right?

Great, now he’s thinking about being magically ghost married to Alex and Luke.

He lifts his head and looks at the notebook again.

_But you can’t see me, not even with a front row view,_

_Look closer, I’m begging you,_

_I have something to tell you,_

He glares, and frustrated, scratches out the last few lines, then tosses the notebook to the other side of the couch. Then he sinks into his seat and looks up at the ceiling.

He misses his mom.

He could have complained about this to her; she’d have made him something to eat and ran her hands through his hair, telling him everything would somehow end up alright. He’d have believed her too. She’d always been on his side, which was more than anybody else in the band could say. He doesn’t know how many times Alex and Luke had slept on the floor of his bedroom, laughing long past midnight, eating old pizza and trying not to wake Reggie’s parents while they messed around, with air guitars and unread textbooks used as drums.

Sometimes, he and Luke would have fallen asleep together in Reggie’s old, twin bed, way too small for the two of them, and Reggie’d complain in the morning about Luke’s sweaty-ass armpits being in his face, but really, the pure heat of him, the slick skin and the soft way his stomach moved while he breathed in his sleep was—

It was—

Well, it might not have been too much of an exaggeration to say that Reggie’s favorite part of band practice was the bits where he and Luke would get close, singing so close they could practically be kiss—

Shit, no. That’s not—

Luke’s never actually been interested.

Obviously.

Reggie isn’t interested either. Not really.

Right?

It’s not like he’s pining, not like he’s writing _love songs about Luke_.

… except for how he really, really is, isn’t he?

Well, trying. And failing.

He groans again, reaching pointlessly for the notebook, and naturally that’s when Luke appears, sitting on the other end of the couch and grabbing the notebook Reggie’d just been reaching for.

“What’s this—” Luke starts, squinting at the writing on the page before Reggie, in a panic, fumbles on the couch and leaps forward, making a solid grab for it that unfortunately doesn’t turn out all that solid.

Both of them suddenly scrambling, Reggie lands in a heap on the floor, dragging Luke down on top of him, notebook crammed uncomfortably between their stomachs.

After a minute of awkward, painful silence, Reggie says, “Ouch,” and Luke sits up just enough to stare incredulously at Reggie’s face and ask, “What the hell?”

Reggie lets his head thump back down on the floor.

“It’s not ready.”

“What? The song you’re working on?”

Reggie blinks.

“You know about that?”

Luke rolls his eyes, and then smiles that devastating smile of his, with the way his mouth quirks up at the corner, and Reggie just cannot deal with it right now, with Luke on top of him, and the song he’s writing stuck in his head, and his stomach churning, and the thought _Why does he have to look at me like that?_ running through his head over and over again.

He sits up, and somehow, without thinking about it, slots their mouths together.

It lasts for less than a second, a soft press of their lips, soft and wet and chapped, and then they’re both jumping away from each other, eyes wide. Luke lands hard on his ass and stares, eyes wide, at Reggie. Voice pitched high with alarm, he asks, “What was that?”

Panic.

Oh God.

Reggie shakes his head, and he's panicking, and he doesn't know what to say in the face of Luke's shock—and finds himself standing in the middle of a beachside hot dog shack.

He covers his face with his hands and resists the sudden urge to cry.

_What is he supposed to do now?_

And then he remembers he forgot the stupid notebook _._


End file.
